Tuesday, October 11, 2016

Focal points in your garden must be so wonderful they are fought over at your estate sale.
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One focal point per garden room, subsidiary focal points allowed.
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Pots in your garden must be so marvelous they never have to be planted.
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Tara's Trinity of focal points, above.
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The best focal points are placed on axis seen from myriad directions, and better, if each of those axis is not visible from the others.
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Focal points must have a focal point view in their opposite direction.
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No matter the slope of your land, focal points must be level.
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You must know these focal point tips within your DNA.
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A delight, below, seeing this pot recently. Pretty all year, even when the herbacious plantings are dormant.
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What did you think, first seeing the pot, below? Did the plantings, and their year-round essence enter into contemplation?

Moving on. More details about siting and living with a focal point. Contemplating a single focal point's effect upon your life, a Providential gift, using my focal point, below.
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Up front, seeing the urn & plinth, below, at a wholesale nursery, I was there buying items for a job, not to get myself a pot/plinth. After making the purchase for the client job, in a hurry, my feet moved me over to the pot/plinth, you knew they would. My DNA knew more than my lizard brain which kept saying, You're in a hurry, no time for this, and certainly no money.
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Wholesale pot/plinth were expensive, and wildly heavy. Had 4 men put it into my pick-up truck.
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Into my garden, below, direct axis from the large bay window fronting my home, my previous 30 year home.

With the urn/plinth at my back, below, this is the view into that bay window. Now you're entering the realm of Living with your focal point. Not merely having your focal point. Huge difference. Huge.

Inside the bay window, below. Living more deeply with the pot/plinth, having meals at the table, bringing my laptop to the table and working, putting together more journal pages at this table.

With the focal point urn/plinth at my back, below, turned to a different axis view, a subsidiary focal point. Ironically a subsidiary focal point, within a subsidiary focal point. Go me ! Know what I am talking about here? Hope so. The blooms of wisteria 'Amethyst Falls' are owning the day, once finished the dovecote recovers its dominance.

Turning to another axis, below, with the urn/plinth at my back, is another subsidiary focal point. A planting designed to greet me as I enter/leave my driveway.

Another axis view, below, with the urn/plinth at my back, Laura watching me, totally acting as if I'm not there.

Another axis view, below, with the urn/plinth at my back. This view another subsidiary focal point within a subsidiary focal point. Who can deny the Chinese snowball is dominant? After flowering the pair of adirondack chairs take their rightful place as subsidiary focal point. And, destination. When the snows of spring are this pretty, not about to walk to the chairs, harming the petals on the ground, or sit in the chairs, harming the petals in the chair. Instead, swimming for days in the intoxicating beauty of the petals.

Bottom 7 pictures, shot in my garden.
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More fabulousity with this urn/plinth, above, the house is at the street with 7 neighbor's homes crowding in. Do you see them? Do they exist? Not in my realm.
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This is garden design as Garden Design, capitals for the same reason as using it with Providence.
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Creating a focal point with the Garden Design 'rules' above creates Sacred space. A moat of grace around your home, and life.
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Today, and for the past 14 months, my urn/plinth have been lying in the materials yard, on their side on a pallet, awaiting placement in our ca. 1900 American farmhouse. Clearing invasives, renovating garden sheds, building new outbuildings, grading, drilling a well, renovations to the house, have all come ahead of starting the Garden. Before moving I tried to tell Beloved what my Garden meant to me. No words existed. I have those words now, having been without my Garden for so long. My Garden was my best Friend, unconditional love.
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Missing my Friend.
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Today, I'll do something I've only done 3-4x's. I discovered it by accident, at present it's the most potent feel good drug I know. I will sit in my materials yard for lunch, with accoutrements from my previous garden, about 10 pallets, Friends awaiting placement in my new Garden. Sacred made Palpable.
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Garden & Be Well, XO T
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At the opposite of creating a Sacred space, I was on the phone yesterday with a client who had to remove an odd/ugly covered porch addition the previous homeowner had added. More than ugly, more than unusable, the space felt 'evil'. Didn't want to be in it or walk thru it to get to the back yard, or even see it. The owner felt it, and her friend, a client who referred me, felt it too. The 'evil' room is now gone, a new space built, with subsidiary gifts. All the 'evil'? Gone !

Thursday, August 18, 2016

Age 8, saw my 1st garden like this, below, in Augusta, GA. The adults were content to stay inside & chat. I did the rude child thing, and begged to go outside. They were glad to get rid of me. Had to be, I was more than glad to be gone from them. Not until I saw the movie, Beetlejuice, did anything describe how I felt, going outside that house, that day, into the garden. Another world.
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The garden was entirely green, wild, mischievously wild. Looking ahead, left, right, the garden was telling me to go everywhere, all a fabulous mystery, yet speaking to me in a language I knew. And, that feeling of being alone, in this adventure, perhaps explains more fully, in adulthood, studying historic landscapes across Europe for decades. And creating the garden for myself.
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Few ask for. or understand, this type garden, up front, in USA. I design as much of them into the ubiquitous requests, as I can. A tiny handful, across 3 decades, have asked for the full monty.
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I was caught by this garden, below, being presumptuous. It's owner, in the public eye for decades with an international successful career, and public persona so Cruella Deville, Meryl Streep played her in a movie. The garden, below, takes her mask off. Anna Wintour's garden, below.

Focal Points & Subsidiary Focal Points must both be so wonderful they will be fought over at your estate sale.

Pots must be so wonderful they can remain empty. This young man, above, has dead plantings and he's fabulous.
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More, he flows with the style of the home's interior.
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Dogs, 3 young children, parents each own a business, they have farm property nearby, and a lake house.
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Get the picture? Zero time for the garden.

Designing for women 80+, taught me how to truly design with tough love. A huge honor, and weight. They demand beauty, must have unskilled labor to maintain & little of it, something coming into bloom every 2 weeks, focal points on axis from inside views into the garden. Nothing can go wrong with the garden. Nothing. Health issues arise, the house needs a new roof, a toilet floods. If the garden has issues, they may decide to move. It is my goal, their garden gives strength & joy to carry on in their home.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic this week in a client garden.
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For a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, become my client,local/on-line.

More regions of the brain activated, than sitting in the office on a computer.

Designing on the computer would be like playing the violin by hooking it up to wires and tapping on the computer keyboard to get the sweetest sounds played. Not !

Whence my creativity, I know. And, nurture.

Within that zone of creativity, is, I imagine, what others gain from cocaine. Don't know, never tried it. Don't need to, got better.

"Some get a kick from cocaine**I'm sure that if I took even one sniffThat would bore me terrific'ly tooYet I get a kick out of you." Cole Porter

Each time a plan completed the awe in time. Felt like seconds, yet hours passed. Little in life allows me to forget time, or hunger.
." My general formula for my students is "Follow your bliss." Find where it is, and don't be afraid to follow it.

Joseph CampbellThe Power of Mythpp. 120, 149 "..Great fear, indeed. Campbell should have added some in your life add to that fear, not trusting the path you've chosen. .My father was horrified at my career choice, and embarrassed. And vocal. My engineering degree unused, the horticulture degree supporting me..What I do for a living, and how I do it, are the best life choices, for me. Bucking my dad literally made me ill at times. .Best choice I've ever made, and the hardest..Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pics from jobsite this spring.
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For a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, become my client,local/on-line.

Monday, January 20, 2014

Seating to create a gathering spot, figs for summer shade/winter sun over the benches, drystack stone wall cut into a slight slope forcing foot traffic into defined directions, formal boxwood framing pastoral views, tapering stone wall allowing only small machinery into the pasture from this direction, gravel terrace ready for men-trucks-heavy equipment, horses, or a catered soiree for 100.
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And, of course, it must all look a century old, be easy to maintain, and provide interest 24/7.
.When something appears simple, it rarely is. Same is true of people.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic at a jobsite last week.
.Do you know the maximum pollinator habitat, above? Seriously, can you verbalize what creates the best pollinator habitat above? Answer at bottom.
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Being simple requires each of the decades I've been learning about gardens. Better, being simple in a garden, takes me where Joseph Campbell says our eternity is. Ironic, in this American life/era, to have found my bliss in work.
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Thursday, August 22, 2013

Yes, this client is waltzing with her garden now. Leading too.
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She surprised me with this little cart. And was correct, never seen one before. Years of fun ahead with this cutie.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pics taken this month in client garden. We've worked almost 3 years to get to this point. Pure play. Of course plantings still arriving in layers too.

Wednesday, July 3, 2013

You've seen dozens of old tool bouquets on toiles across the span of your life.

Old tools in my garage are ladies-in-waiting.

Think this bit of garden is serendipitous? Unplanned? Needs weeding? A trinity of wrong. This garden room is rustic balance with its formal companions nearby.
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Garden Design is all about contrasts. And finding a way to hang lovely old tools.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pics shot in Susanne Hudson's garden last month. Seems old tools, old terra cotta & old tin are a new trinity.

Monday, July 1, 2013

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How few choose to hang their 6" pots of hydrangea!
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pics last month in Suzanne Hudson's garden. Don't you still see people talking in their Batman/Robin cutouts? No? How boring. I do. Of course I thought they were the stupidest thing on the planet watching, enthralled, the first run episodes.

Friday, June 21, 2013

The micro garden design.
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Perhaps the strongest tool in Garden Design, micro garden design, making your garden MORE you.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Susanne Hudson's garden, pics taken earlier this month. I laughed out loud when I saw this pair, had been in the garden days earlier and did not see them.
.Remember this garden design rule at the antique shops, art shows, garage sales, junk stores, it's your permission to buy!

Friday, May 31, 2013

relationship to their surroundings.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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For many years I maintained a small townhome back garden for a client. She had a little rabbit that I would move each week, as if it were nibbling her flowers. Her garden was always done on Fridays, her area of town has the BEST estate sales. These cats are at my front door, pics taken this month.

Thursday, May 30, 2013

Welcome? Don't have it in a 'word', say it with your front door, paint color, light fixture, door mat, plants, & etc.
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Let 'words' in your garden be subsidiary focal points, amplified in the song of your garden.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic taken near my front door last week. A Christine Sibley piece. Of course bought long before she died. The ivy 'Gold Heart' is not aggressive.

Tuesday, May 28, 2013

The Well Placed Chair must suit the theme you've chosen & leverage it.
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You must have at least a pair of chairs for The Well Placed Chair rule !
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Paint them the color of your front door, trim or shutters or an accent color threading thru all your interior art works.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pics taken last weekend in my garden. Oakleaf hydrangeas are incredible this year. The Well Placed Chair rule was an epiphany after touring Sir Walter Scott's garden.

Tuesday, March 26, 2013

Whimsey is for the intellect.
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Pure narrative. Got any in your garden? These cats, this narrative, melts me.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic Deborah Silver, Dirt Simple. She designs & owns a nursery. Take the link, enjoy her shop. Are there even 10 such shops in USA?
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This pair of cats are also, subsidiary focal points. Name it to claim it. I've had to name a lot of things in this garden design world.

Saturday, January 12, 2013

Seeing, above, I knew my predilection for the unusual inside-a-cloche completely ignored the mundane.
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A good day includes at least 1 epiphany.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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pic Paris Through My Lens
.If you want a garden that is a moat of grace around your home & life, contact me..Details about online design services..Learn action steps to creating your best garden & home when youhire me to speak to your group..Details about lecture titles here..I've written several garden books available on Amazon.